Institution of a matter

You must make your complaint or investigation request in writing. It must indicate the name and contact details of the complainant or person making the investigation request. Anonymous messages will not be processed as complaints, but information in such messages may be taken into account when targeting the Intelligence Ombudsman's supervision activities. The contact details are needed in case additional information or a rejoinder is needed, as well as for delivering the decision made regarding the complaint or investigation request.

A complaint should describe as precisely as possible:
       ▪ the authority whose practices the complaint involves;
       ▪ the activity;
       ▪ the time and date of the activity; and
       ▪ a justification of why the complainant considers the authority to have violated the law.

An investigation request should describe as precisely as possible:
       ▪ the authority whose intelligence gathering the person making the investigation request has 
         been or is suspected to have been subject;
       ▪ a description of how the intelligence gathering method was employed; and
       ▪ the time and date of the intelligence gathering.

Complaints and investigation requests can be sent by post to the address Intelligence Ombudsman, P.O. Box 800, 00531 Helsinki, Finland, or by email to tiedusteluvalvonta(at)om.fi. If the complaint or investigation request contains confidential or sensitive information, you can send it as an encrypted message via the Ministry of Justice's secure email service. Please read the instructions for sending secure email before using the service. 

The processing of a complaint or investigation request is free of charge.